Monday, September 22, 2008

Melville Stone was a self-made man, who worked his way up from newspaper carrier to publisher of the Chicago Daily News. When Stone first started his newspaper in 1875, the price was a penny. Circulation rose rapidly at first, then leveled off. Then sales started lagging. When Stone investigated why fewer people were buying his paper, he discovered the problem had nothing to do with its quality. Pennies were in short supply. Stone decided he had to do something.First he traveled to the United States mint in Philadelphia and brought about the transfer of barrels of pennies to Chicago. The problem then became how to get the pennies into circulation. So Stone persuaded Chicago merchants to sponsor "odd-price sales," during which they would sell their merchandise for a penny under the regular price. The odd prices did the trick. People had pennies again, and Stone’s paper flourished. And that is why store items today cost "$8.99," or $12.99," instead of even dollar amounts.

Rule 2 : The world won't care about your self-esteem. The world will expect you to accomplish something BEFORE you feel good about yourself.

Rule 3 : You will NOT make $60,000 a year right out of high school. You won't be a vice-president with a car phone until you earn both.

Rule 4 : If you think your teacher is tough, wait till you get a boss.

Rule 5 : Flipping burgers is not beneath your dignity. Your Grandparents had a different word for burger flipping: they called i t opportunity.

Rule 6: If you mess up, it's not your parents' fault, so don't whine about your mistakes, learn from them.

Rule 7: Before you were born, your parents were n't as boring as they are now. They got that way from paying your bills, cleaning your clothes and listening to you talk about how cool you thought you were. So before you save the rain forest from the parasites of your parent's generation, try delousing the closet in your own room.

Rule 8: Your school may have done away with winners and losers, but life HAS NOT. In some schools, they have abolished failing grades and they'll give you as MANY TIMES as you want to get the right answer. This doesn't bear the slightest resemblance to ANYTHING in real life.

Rule 9: Life is not divided into semesters. You don't get summers off and very few employers are interested in helping you FIND YOURSELF. Do that on your own time.

Rule 10: Television is NOT real life. In real life people actually have to leave the coffee shop and go to jobs.

Monday, September 15, 2008

It started in the U.S. and has conquered the world. In some parts of the world it sells for three times the price of liquor. It was originally sold as a brain tonic, but was poorly received. What is the name of this drink product?

Thursday, September 11, 2008

It's hard to believe that it has been 7 years since the attack. I think all of us reflect on those events fairly regularly. It still bothers me that we were so vulnerable. I can't imagine how anyone would be willing to do such a thing. How lost must you be to even imagine such a thing. I can remember waking up to my alarm that was set to play the radio when it went off. Hearing the news, being mostly asleep, it didn't register what had or was happening. I was cleaning carpets at the time. I drove into work, listening to the updates, getting sicker by the moment, not understanding why this was happening. We only got a couple of jobs done before my boss cancelled the days work and sent us home. I can remember sitting at home, watching in horror at the images on the TV. One plane, then two...three...four. When was it going to stop. It felt personal. There was nothing we all could do but wait. My first thought was my parents. At the time they lived in New York. I was immediately worried. This was irrational, they lived in upper state, nowhere near the city, but still I needed to call and make sure. I must have left 10 messages before they called back and let me know everything was OK. September 11 will always be remembered as a sad day in our history.

2,974 people died in the attacks. Another 24 are missing and presumed dead. Most of the people who died were civilians and represented over 90 different countries. The hijackers used box cutters to gain control of the planes and to kill anyone who tried to stop them. Think of that next time someone complains about how stringent the security is at the airports. They also had fake bombs to keep everyone at bay. 1,366 people died who were at or above the floors of impact in the North Tower. As many as 600 people were killed instantly or were trapped at or above the floors of impact in the South Tower. At least 200 people jumped to their deaths from the burning towers. A total of 411 emergency workers who responded to the scene died as they attempted to implement rescue and fire suppression efforts.

The Stock Market never opened for business and remained closed for a week. When it did open on September 17th, by weeks end, the Dow had dropped over 14%. US stocks lost 1.4 trillion in value. In New York City, there were approximately 430,000 lost job months and $2.8 billion in lost wages, which occurred in the three months following the 9/11 attacks. Approximately 18,000 small businesses were destroyed or displaced after the attacks. North American air space was closed for several days after the attacks. I can remember Helena making a comment about how she could never remember a more eerie time because when you looked up, you couldn't see any planes.

It makes me sad to think that the twin towers are gone. One of the best pictures my parents had was a picture they took once while in the city. Its a picture of the twin towers on a cloudy day. Its just beautiful. Friends of ours went on vacation this summer and accidentally stumbled on ground zero. They were trying not to visit it, but ended up taking a wrong turn. All of them were crying instantly and felt the grief all over again. On the day of the attacks, Giuliani proclaimed, "We will rebuild. We're going to come out of this stronger than before, politically stronger, economically stronger. " The rebuilding process continues today. It bothers me that it is taken this long. Sadly, the funds have been available and spent but for political reasons, little has been accomplished. On the sites of the totally destroyed buildings, one, 7 World Trade Center, has a new office tower which was completed in 2006. The Freedom Tower is currently under construction at the site and at 1,776 ft (541 m) upon completion in 2011, will become the one of the tallest buildings in North America. Three more towers are expected to be built between 2007 and 2012 on the site, and will be located one block east of where the original towers stood.

At the time, and I still think, that we should have rebuilt the two towers exactly as they were as quickly as possible. I think that would have the best way to show that you can bend America, but you can not break us.

Monday, September 8, 2008

Wednesday, September 3, 2008

For thousands of years doctors told patients suffering from pain to chew on the bark of a willow tree. Even as far back as 400 B.C. Hippocrates recommended a tea made from yellow leaves. It wasn't until the 1800's that scientists discovered what was in the willow tree that relieved pain and reduced fever.

About Me

I should probably start with explaining the "Bill the Great". It was a nickname I aquired at and old job. I had not really thought of it in a long time until I was pondering a blog site name. It is not anything that I take seriously, so please, take it lightly! I grew up in Scottsdale and have lived my entire life in Arizona. I have been married for 16 years and have four children, Billy, Kyra, Tasha, and Payton.